


to lead you down this light

by flagvalley



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Genre: Afterlife, Death from Old Age, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-18
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:42:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29544639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flagvalley/pseuds/flagvalley
Summary: At the end, Link goes gently into the twilight, and finds what he has waited for.
Relationships: Link/Midna (Legend of Zelda)
Kudos: 34





	to lead you down this light

At the end, he is not alone.

Nor does he pretend to even a sliver of glory. He heaves and hisses on a humble straw-stuffed bed in the village he once called his home. Ordon relinquished that title many decades ago, but will never refuse him, no matter how many times he leaves.

He has spent more of his life on horseback than on his feet. He has found words of welcome in every corner of the world, but none have ever been able to keep him in one place for long, even when he gives it his best efforts. There is always another wrong calling for him to right it. Even now, some call him nothing more than a vagabond playing at vigilantism. Most call him hero. Only a few, those who know him best, call him restless.

Old bones grow weary as all are bound to do. His knee goes first, and nobody pays it much mind, least of all him, but then his hips start to hurt with every step. Soon, his coughs turn into terrible, guttural sounds that he tries to spare his loved ones from hearing. It does not take long before the rest of his body fails him as well.

The old Queen, still sharp-witted and straight-backed as ever, sends for the best doctors Hyrule has to offer, but they all tell her the same thing.

"It is his time."

And she, being Wise, understands. She asks him which place he thinks of when he thinks of rest, and makes sure he is transported there in good time. He slips into his first tree-house with a smile, but even here, his myopic eyes always wander out the window just as the sky shifts to orange.

The hero never married and never made a family by blood, but his family by choice have all gathered to see him off. The Queen is there, as misplaced as she looks in this rural hut. Ilia is there too, of course, as is Colin, with his soldier's armor and children of his own. The old hero looks at him and sees Rusl in his face, along with so many others who have gone down this road before him. Shad and Ashei will be the only ones left to carry the legacy of Telma's group. They are not with him now, but they said their farewells when he was still strong enough to ride off into the sunset. All three preferred that as their final image of him.

Ilia is rarely seen without any of her four children and seven grandchildren at her side, but this time, she has left them to tend to hearths and chop firewood and craft reed whistles elsewhere. She wanted to spare the little ones the sight. She sits closest to him, her hands folded over his blanket, her gentle eyes a soothing balm for the last pulsating aches. She says little; she only waits, like she always has. She learned long ago not to ask so many questions. He had lost the hide of the farm boy she once knew when he came back from his journey, and the whys and the hows and the whens are shadowy territories where she does not belong. It is enough that she is there. That much will never change.

Only Queen Zelda knows all the stories behind his scars and wrinkles. She stands at the foot of his bed, her fingers resting lightly upon the headboard. She feels the weight of losing him sinking in her chest already, as if she is watching the disintegration of her own right arm. She alone knows that just as her daughter also bears the name Zelda, boys in green spring up from the unlikeliest of corners in every generation, and that some of them go on to be recorded in divine memory, and so neither of their existences will ever truly be gone in the grander sense. Despite this, this particular feral-eyed boy who went on to walk the line between man and beast will leave an emptiness in her, and in all her lands.

It stings, but it is difficult to weep when they see the look on his face. His breaths are growing thinner, and his eyes are already starting to look beyond, but his smile is still here with them. Perfectly calm, easing their worries like it always has. His simplest form of heroism.

The room lets in a gentle veil of twilight. The sun's darkening rays caress his face, then his blankets.

His last breaths are so soft that they cannot distinguish which one is the very last.

Ilia feels it first, and she gasps, and allows herself to break. Colin rushes to her side, his head hanging low. The Queen closes her eyes and clasps her hands and sends him a prayer of gratitude. Outside, the sky shifts.

To him, the room is fading fast into a shade he cannot name. It is not quite darkness, not quite dusk, but bleeding into a new kind of nothing. He notices that he is standing on his feet. He cannot stop smiling, because he knows what is coming.

An apparition, tall and regal, emerges from the shadows, a devious smirk on her lips. She is just as she was in his last memory of her, the one that echoed throughout his lifetime. He reaches out to her. She takes his hand. 

"Well then, you washed-up old wolf — ready to go?"

Even as she says it, he is no longer old. He is seventeen, dressed in hero's garbs, his hair once again like wheat and his frame strong again. He is grinning, just like when he saw her true form for the first time. Canine, and ready to be wild again.

There should be sorrow in his eyes; for those he leaves behind, for not getting more time to do his work, for the lifetime spent looking at sunsets and longing for the figure that now leads him away by the hand, but there is none. He is where he belongs.

Only she looks apologetic. Her eyes are soft in a way only he knew they could be, not only out of affection.

"I'm sorry I... took so long."

He shakes his head. It does not matter anymore. She grips his hand tighter, unable to take her eyes off him.

"But sooner or later, a queen always keeps her promises!"

For just a moment, she looks back. Another queen, now left behind, cannot see nor hear her, but even after all these years there is still that slight pull when they think of each other. Hearts are not so easily torn apart. She should know.

"I like the looks of the life you had," she whispers to him, pulling him closer, and he beams again, as if that brings him pride.

There is a light now, of a sort they have never known before, growing around them.

"Everyone is waiting," she says. "And those who are not will come in their turn."

They stop, just before they step over the threshold. Her fingers brush his cheek. He folds his other hand over hers, trapping it, so she cannot escape him this time. He settles in her gaze, and maybe there is now a hint of heartache, just to show her how it is being mended by hope. That is what finally melts her. She lets her forehead drop down to meet his.

"I was waiting, too," she murmurs. 

Together, they let the light envelop them, until they are no more.


End file.
